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Do you see Jesus for who he really is? Did the disciples do so as Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem? Reverend Daniel shares from his sermon entitled, What Do You See? based on Luke chapter 18.

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In this land season, we are continuing our sermon series on selected portions from Luke's Gospel. Today we are looking at Luke chapter 18, verse 31 to 43 together. It begins, uh Luke 18, verse 31 begins by the solemn words of Jesus. Jesus took the child aside and told them, See, we are going to Jerusalem, Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. For he will be delivered over to the Gentiles, will be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. After flogging him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise. But they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said. The context of Jesus' impending betrayal and their pains, the backdrop of the reading before us. There's a note of divine necessity that is mentioned here, where Luke tells us everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. This recalls the word that was spoken at Jesus' transfiguration earlier in Luke, Luke 9.31, where Jesus was transfigurated together with Moses and Elijah in their presence. And during that transfiguration, he had a conversation with Moses and Elijah. And he spoke about the exodus or the departure that will soon take place. And now we see more and more the fruition of what that was promised earlier in Luke. The stakes are higher now, and the intensity of the people's response to Jesus increases. Would the disciples and his would-be disciples today, all of us here, see Jesus for who he really is. That is, as the true son of David. Today I've entitled my sharing, What Do You See? What do you see today as we consider Jesus? We see here that the disciples were oblivious to Jesus' impending betrayal and death. Luke 18, 34 tells us they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said. In contrast to the disciples, we read from Luke 18, verse 35 to 43 that a blind beggar ceases. Let's look at the account from Luke 18, verse 35 to 43 together. As Jesus drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. And hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what this meant. They told him, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. And he began to cry out, Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me. And those who were in front rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he cried out all the more, Son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus stopped and commanded him to be brought to him. And when he came near, he asked the blind man, What do you want me to do for you? He said, Lord, let me recover my sight. And Jesus said to him, Recover your sight, your faith has made you well. And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him, glorifying God. And all the people that, when they saw it, gave praise to God. In terms of the power and privilege of the day, the blind beggar that cried out to Jesus would belong to the 5 or 10 percent of the population known as the expendables, for whom society as a whole had no need. Forced by his physical malady to leave off the charity of others, he would have had no attachment to possessions or kin. His existence, his very existence, would have been an embarrassment, marginal to the daily lives of others. And if not for the premium placed on Elms Giving in Jewish circles, he would be in a much more destitute state. Yet we see here that though he was expendable and disregarded by the society of the day, Luke wants us to see that this blind beggar possessed unusual insight. Not just insight, but unparalleled and unusual insight. Because despite his blindness, he sees Jesus for who he really is. So the question is, what does the blind beggar see? Twice he calls out to Jesus, and this is key. How the beggar addressed Jesus is key in Luke's gospel. He said, Son of David, have mercy on me. Son of David, have mercy on me. Jesus' status as son of David is crucial in his identity in the Gospel of Luke. It was established in the above narratives. We read uh chapter 1 and chapter 2 of Luke. We see it peppered all along, uh, around the two chapters. Uh the virgin was betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David. Talking about Jesus in Luke 1, 32 to 35, he says, He, Jesus, will be great and be called son of the most high. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom there will be no end. And Joseph, when he went out from Galilee in Luke chapter 2, verse 4, from the town of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David. So Luke wants us to see that Jesus and his line of descendants, his father Joseph, comes from the godly line, the line of promise, the line of David. And interestingly, in Luke, uh pivotal in his uh theology is the understanding that this is the first time, the first public declaration in Luke identifying Jesus as the son of David. The first time, and it came from the mouth of a disregarded blind beggar. It came from his mouth. Son of David, have mercy on me. Going back a bit more uh into the Old Testament, we see in 2 Samuel chapter 7, verse 12 to 16, and Psalm 89. Uh, the book, the both texts in the Old Testament provides a sense of inviolatability and security of the promises that God makes to David. In 2 Samuel chapter 7, verse 12 to 16, David wanted to build God a house, a place for God to dwell in. But the Lord replied David in 2nd Samuel chapter 7, verse 10 to 11. But he said, I will make you a house instead. And 2 Samuel chapter 7, verse 12 to 16 goes on to say, uh, when your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. So there's a sense that the promise of God upon David and his line stands forever. It goes on to say, and your house and your kingdom, David's house and his kingdom, shall be made sure before God forever. Your throne shall be established forever. If you do a close reading of the whole chapter in 2 Samuel 7, you will notice in verse 12, verse 16, verse 19, verse 26, and verse 29. Eight times, eight times the Lord promised to make David a house, which was a line of descendants, which the Lord will give him for all time. And interestingly, six times David's kingdom was declared to be eternal. It is an eternal kingdom that will be given to David and his descendants. We see that also in Psalm 89. Uh, Psalm 89, three times the idea is repeated that I will establish your offspring forever and build your throne for all generations. So even when the people of Israel were in exile because of their sin and rebellion against God, there is a sense of expectation of a future work that God will do. The Davidic covenant and dynasty mentioned in 2 Samuel 7, 12 to 16, became infused with a hope for something that God will do in a future time. Amos spoke of the rebuilding of the booth of David that is fallen and the repair of his bridges. Amos 9, verse 11 to 12. Hosea spoke in similar terms, even though the children of Israel shall dwell many days without sacrifice or pillar, without effort or household gods, yet afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their king. Hosea 3, verses 4 to 5. So when the blind beggar saw Jesus and calls out to him, Jesus as the son of David and pleads with him for mercy. Son of David, have mercy on me. He's invoking and calling out to the Old Testament expectations of the renewal of the Davidic dynasty. As a long-awaited king from the line of David, Jesus would reestablish the throne of David, he would deliver Israel from his enemies and he would reign forever. So we see from Luke 18, uh, verse 31 to 43 that no one in the time of Jesus and in his ministry, no one, absolutely no one, is outside the bounds of God's grace and mercy. What we need today is eyes to see, hearts open to understand that Jesus is the Son of David. Do you see Jesus for who he is and what he's able to accomplish in you today? As you call out to him, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. Regardless of where we are spiritually with Jesus, that is a new beginning and a fresh start for all of us. Broken hearts, broken lives, as a song reminds us, he will take them all. Jesus would receive us. That's without a doubt. We see that time and time again in the Gospels. But the question is, do we see our need for his intervention in our lives? Jesus asked the blind man, What do you want me to do for you? So Jesus today asked us the same question, what do you want me to do for you? And the blind man had only one request Let me see. Lord help me recover my sight. And Jesus said, Recover your sight. Your faith in me as the son of David has made you well. The irony of this uh story is that the blind beggar, though he was blind, though he was destitute, though he was uh almost the background of society, uh, and expendable, someone that no one will notice, uh, that is begging right at the city gates. Yet he sees. He had the faith to reach out to Jesus and spiritual sight to see Jesus, unusual spiritual insight to see Jesus as who he really is. The promised son of David. And we know in Luke's gospel that Jesus, as a son of David, he comes to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins. Luke chapter 1, verse 77. The irony is this the disciples who were together with Jesus, they were ministering to him, sleeping with him, walking with him, seeing him heal the sick, deliver, uh raise the dead, multiplying the loaves. They were with him day and night. You know, uh it for us, it probably is an extended mission trip for a few years with Jesus. Sleeping with him, seeing how his minister first sent, observing what Jesus was doing. Yet they did not see. They could not make sense that Jesus as the Son of Man would need to be delivered to the Gentiles, be mocked and shamefully treated, flocked and killed, and rise again after three days. The implication for us today, as we sit and hear God's word, is that unless, unless we see Jesus suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection as the heart of God's plan for saving us, we have not truly seen him. Let me repeat again, unless we see Jesus' suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection as the heart of God's plan for saving us, we have not truly seen him. The disciples miss it. The blindbeggers saw it and reached out to Jesus in faith. How about us? Do we see? Do we have eyes to see Jesus for who he really is and what he can do for us, which we can never do for ourselves? The heart of the saving plan of God is spelled one word, you know, uh one word, and the word is forgiveness. You want to sum up the gospel, we can sum it up in one word, forgiveness. And it takes a few years or even decades to understand what forgiveness really means and applied to our lives, and what forgiveness means and applies to our own healing, what forgiveness means and apply to our relationship with one another, and what forgiveness means to reach out to a world in need of Christ. Forgiveness is the heart of what Jesus did. And sometimes, as I reflect on it, we can't really blame ourselves today because of the church culture and just because of the way uh we receive the gospel. Uh, that's not the way in the time of Jesus. In the time of, sorry, in the time of Old Testament, right up to the time of Jesus, uh, for the people of Israel, sacrifice, forgiveness is a very real thing. It's almost a daily thing because each time they come before God's presence, there must always be a sacrifice. So I just getting a bit visual here. Yeah, so this is a this is a lamb, right? Uh hoy lamb, right? So each time uh Israelite comes before God, there must be a sacrifice. So they can't come before God just empty-handed, like sometimes how we come, we just come to sing some songs and to feel good. But Jesus, but in the time of Old Testament, each time uh the believers come before God, there must always be a sacrifice. They know that it must be a perfect, a spotless sacrifice. So whenever they come before God, they bring uh the sacrifice, the animal, whatever it is, whether it's birds, pigeon, uh goat, calves, uh uh sheep, lambs, but cattles, right? So each time they come before God, they have to bring a sacrifice. And this sacrifice has to be sometimes for the family, and depending on your economic situation, you know, uh certain families who are poorer bring pigeons, you know, and so on. So there are different uh order of the day, different types of sacrifices. But the Old Testament, uh uh, in the Old Testament, Israel is very well aware, this concept of forgiveness and sacrifice is part of their worship. So they can't think of coming to God without any sacrifice, they can't come to God, in fact, they will be uh, in fact, judged and killed. They always have to have a perfect sacrifice that that that they will bring with them as they come before God. So I like one preacher say that whenever God calls us to his presence and to worship him, whenever we assemble together in God's house, you always bring something. You always bring something to sacrifice to God, even if it's you and your rats, you always bring something, you cannot come empty-handed before the presence of God. So this sense of sacrifice of sins is heightened on the day of atonement in the Old Testament, uh, recorded in Leviticus 16. Other than offering a bull as a sin offering for himself and his family, cleansing the altar and so on, Aaron was instructed to take two goats and set them before the Lord at the entrance of the tent of meeting. Aaron was instructed to cast lots over the two goats, one of which is to be presented to God as a sin offering. The other goat was to be presented alive before the Lord to make the big theological word is atonement over it. Is then sent away into the wilderness to Azazel, which is a place in the wilderness. So, what does atonement, a big uh theological word, mean in Leviticus 16? It's a very visual reminder. Leviticus 16, verse 21 to 22 tells us Aaron shall lay his hands on the head of the live goat, right? So it's a very visual thing. You know, each time the day of atonement, they take a goat before, you know, and I wonder how they hold the goat down in time to confess the sins of all the people. And Aaron has to do that yearly. It's a ritual he has to do, right? I don't have uh many uh uh examples of a big goat, but I do have one uh small goat, it's a nanny goat that I carry around, you know, and sometimes uh the Lord prompts me that this is a good way to witness, to share the gospel, right? Over the story of a goat, uh Leviticus 16, you know, where this goat, this small goat is a nanny goat, but in in actual fact, uh all the sins of the people have to be confessed over the head of the goat. And this is what happens, right? Uh year after year, this is what happens. Uh Aaron will confess all the sins of the live goat and then send it away to the wilderness by the hand of the man who is in readiness. And the goat shall bear all the iniquities on itself to a remote area, and he shall let the goat go free in the wilderness. So this is a visual picture of what a big uh theological uh concept like atonement looks like. Atonement basically it means God's act of dealing with sin. In broad terms, it means how God deals with sin in our lives. So we read, we read also from Isaiah 53, verse 5 that Jesus uh was wounded for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace. With his stripes, we are healed. I think one of the greatest uh um ways that the devil holds us as Christians captive, including myself, as I reflect uh on my own life as I was preparing the sermon last night, is that we are often blinded to the reality that God is forgiving our sins. We have no problem that God is forgiving our past sins, right? That's why we are Christians, right? We are baptized, we go under the water, we come up, we say, Oh, hallelujah, I'm washed, I'm clean. But how about ongoing sins? Do we realize that Jesus' sacrifice is also for our present, continuous sins? Each time when we sin, we can turn to Jesus. That He is constantly, as we turn to Him, He able to forgive us of our sins. Often Christians, uh, not just in the Pentecostal charismatic circles, but uh most uh you do a quick scan of sermons, you hear sermons online, there's a lot of focus, especially the megachurches, about the victorious and overcoming life and all the blessings of life in and through Jesus. But I think the struggle is not so much about all the blessings and all the victories and all the overcoming life we want to live. But the struggle is the failure to apply the forgiveness of sins to our lives daily. I repeat again, the struggle that we Christians face, including myself, is the struggle to apply the forgiveness of our sins to our lives daily. And we are not helped by that because we lack the visible and visual reminder that we need a sacrifice for our sins. Just as how in the Old Testament, bulls and goats had to be offered to make atonement for sins. In the New Testament, we have Jesus, who had been made a perfect sacrifice for our sins. So we need to appropriate Christ as a perfect sacrifice for our sins in the present time. Not just the future, not just the past, but right here and now. 1 John chapter 2, verse 2 reminds us that he, referring to Jesus, is the propitiation or in layman term, the atoning sacrifice for our sins. And not ours only, John says, but for the sins of the whole world. Joe Briscoe in in addressing the issue of forgiveness gives us a good perspective of what forgiveness is about. Once she was typing out her sermon manuscript, and it kept coming back to the one word which she had spelled wrongly. So she's probably a fast writer, so she types a lot of uh spell check, a lot of words underlying. So when I do uh when I write my sermon, I don't like to have all those lines. So I will quickly do a correct because I don't like to see the red lines everywhere. So I always do a quick correct so that I'll see a plain sheet, a nice sheet without all the underlining red marks. So but she's used to that, right? So each time she typed the spell check, always prompt the error, right? So she realized she had spelled the word wrongly, right? Uh she had spelled forgiveness wrongly. She has spelled it as forgiveness. So it's spelled F-O-R-G-I-V-E M E S S, right? Instead of F-O-R-G-I-V-E-N-E-S-S. So instead of a N, she puts an M, forgive mess, forgive mess. Then she thought about it, actually makes quite a lot of sense. You know, because Jesus forgives our mess, right? So the forgiveness of God, the forgiveness of God forgives the mess that we go through. And we know in Singapore we we live in a very unforgiving culture, right? At the workplace and all, once we uh in some way make big mistakes, you know, we have no second chance, right? There's no turning back, and we are always out uh to perform and make sure that we don't make mistakes. We don't allow ourselves to be uncovered, so to speak, right? We and but sometimes we steep up, right? We we make mistakes. Yeah, so the the key thought is this the forgiveness of God forgives the mess. He forgives the mess in our families, the mess in our world, the mess we make and the mess that others make for us, he wants to forgive it all. Do we believe, truly believe that Jesus can forgive our mess and give us more than a second chance? My challenge to us today is if the blind beggar who was an expandable, for whom society as a whole had no need, if he could find mercy and help in Jesus, this implies that we can also uh receive that from Jesus. No sin is too great, no one is too small, no one is too far from the reach of Jesus. Do you see Jesus as your atoning sacrifice? Can you come to him to receive his forgiveness daily? And we need that. None of us here, including myself, it's just that we are not used to the idea. But all of us need to experience that forgiveness. Otherwise, we have a lot of relational conflict around us, whether in office, in church, everywhere, because we can't release forgiveness. Perhaps because we have not really experienced daily forgiveness. I guarantee you, if you walk with Jesus and you daily ask him to forgive you and cleanse your sins, you'll be a much happier person, much more released, much more forgiving to those around us. But the sad thing about this reality is this sometimes the most bitter, unforgiving people are found in churches today. Those of us who sing of the love and grace of Jesus, each time we say hallelujah, we raise up songs, our hands singing songs, uh, worthy is the Lamb, and all. And yet in our hearts we say, Oh, that idiot, that idiot down there. I really can't get the person out of my mind or wait till I get my revenge. So this is how as humans we live, right? Uh we are broken. That's why we need God's mercy, because if we are true to ourselves, in even myself, we all struggle with those feelings of the need to extend grace and forgiveness. But there's no capacity to do that unless we receive it first from Jesus, unless we experience his forgiveness, unless we come to him and see him as our atoning sacrifice. So this is the dilemma. A lot of times we sing of the love and grace of Jesus, yet we never experience the reality of being forgiven. And we have it in our Anglican liturgy, we have it in our worship order. You know, we have the time to come before the Lord to confess our sins. Every service you come, whether it's communion, uh Sunday, or morning prayer, you know, you have a chance to allow the Lord to search your hearts and to come before Him. Uh especially in uh in the Anglican setup. So why don't you make use of it to come before the Lord? You know, allow him to search your hearts, allow him to deal with sin in your life. Jesus offers hope today. He wants to give us eyes to see, hands to reach out to him to receive his forgiveness. And sometimes what would bring all this home uh sometimes is a good and wonderful hymn or song that reminds us once again of what Jesus does for us. You know, and I think sometimes we are used to singing a lot of contemporary songs, uh, whether it's uh because there was time is hill song, gateway worship, and I'm not into music, so I the latest is uh what's that? Battle music. Yeah, so we have a lot of songs on battle music. Uh but I don't I didn't grow up with those songs. I grew up with songs like Shout to the Lord, Power of Your Love, and even earlier songs by Hill songs like Eagle's Wings, and far earlier, you know, songs like uh Come on and celebrate his gift of love, we will celebrate, you know. But we seldom hear those songs. But sometimes when we sing those songs, something in us, you know, uh breaks out. You know, uh I was hearing uh one camp that a pastor led, you know, the pastor was talking about intergeneral uh worship, you know, and he he got a speaker to speak of that. So then throughout the camp, realized that a lot of songs they sing are all probably from gateway worship or what is that again, battle music, you know. So, like very few songs. So the older people were a bit uh uh discomfort, uh uncomfortable to put to put it nicely. They were uncomfortable, you know. So then they spoke to the speaker, uh come worship all these songs, you know, all the new songs, you know. So the speaker went to the worship team and say, Okay, uh, can we sing the song Holy, Holy, Holy? Right? You know, the song, the hymn, holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty. So everyone sang that. Everyone stood up and sang. And there was a chorus of praise that just went reached to the heavens. People were just enlivened because they are singing songs that they identify with. Right? So each generation will have their own. Yeah, but we are not just a multi-generation church, right? Multi-generation we all have everywhere, not just in church, in society. Like now we have multi-generation, right? We have those older, those younger. But when we talk about intergenerational, it's different. Right? It means that the older and younger one must learn to work together, talk to one another, right? So I hope one day that we will take steps to move towards being intergenerational. You know, not that we don't need the older ones, not that we don't need the younger ones, but we need both to work together. Right? And uh the song that I was reminded of is I just like to read the lyrics to you and maybe uh sing it once through. It's a very familiar chorus uh that sometimes we we forget about it, right? But I don't know why I'm not a worship leader, I'm not a musician, but whenever I prepare sermons, sometimes towards the end, the Lord will give me songs. She'll give me certain choruses, you know, and I'll hum the chorus as I prepare the sermon. And sometimes that song becomes like the seal of the deal. That sense, yeah, God, this is a song I think that you want to use to minister that brings rounds up everything. And and this is a song, uh, it's a very old song uh that says, Lamb of God, I exhort you, Jesus, my sacrifice. Okay, it goes like that. Thank you, Eileen, for putting up the lyrics, right?

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Um, it goes this way Lamb of God, Holy One, Jesus Christ, Son of God, lifted up willing thee to the dead either guilt may know the blood one shed, still freely flowing, still cleansing, still he exhort you Jesus myself I exhort you my redeem and my Lord I exhort you were the land of God and in bow down before your throne.

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So this song, I don't know. Is it familiar to many of us? Can I have a show of hands? Know this song? Wow, maybe we should start singing uh songs like this, right? It just brings us together closer to Jesus. And I think this song uh speaks to me as I prepare the word. I think it's a song for us today, you know that the Jesus is the Lamb of God, and the work of Jesus of washing and cleansing us, the blood still flows, still cleanses, still heals. And we exalt Jesus because he is our sacrifice. We exalt Jesus, he is the worthy Lamb of God, and in honor we bow down before Israel. Just a reminder for us again uh this picture of a lamb. John tells us that Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

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We pray that you've been ministered to by the Word of God today. If you'd like to know more about the Eastern Christian Church, please visit our website at yccanglican.com. Have a blessed day.